NEW YORK, (Reuters):
STOCKS DECLINED slightly in trading yesterday as investor fears about the possibility of a United States-led war with Iraq offset earlier gains on some good results from big-name retailers.
Shares of Costco Wholesale Corp., the largest U.S. discount warehouse operator, fell to their lowest level in nearly three years after it posted a five per cent drop in quarterly profit. Pepsi Bottling Group Inc., the largest bottler of Pepsi drinks, also cast a cloud after it warned about its 2003 earnings.
But geopolitical issues kept Wall Street on edge.
"The biggest factor still seems to be the overhang on the uncertainty from Iraq," said Tim Anderson, a senior trader with Salomon Smith Barney in New York.
Yesterday afternoon, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Iraq has still not made a "strategic political" decision to disarm.
Foreign ministers from France, Germany and Russia said yesterday they would not allow a resolution authorising war in Iraq to be approved in the United Nations Security Council. The United States has been pushing for such a resolution as U.S. and British troops mount in the Gulf.
The Dow Jones industrial average dipped 16 points or 0.20 per cent to 7.689, while the broader Standard & Poor's 500 Index added 0.05 of a point, or 0.01 per cent, to 822. The technology-laced Nasdaq Composite Index slipped three points or 0.26 per cent to 1,305.
Nervous investors have been scooping up U.S. Treasuries, which are seen as a safer bet in tumultuous times. The yield on the benchmark 10-year note earlier touched a four-month low at 3.61 per cent, coming close to the 40-year low around 3.56 per cent hit in October.
